Live Review

The Young Knives – Night & Day Cafe, Manchester

• 28th Nov 2007

A packed out Night & Day sees the return to Manchester of Oxford’s very own super-geek rock ‘n’ roll stars The Young Knives.

The support act was merely average, so much so that I had no interest of even catching their names. But as for The Young Knives once again they were astounding. They stood on stage looking prim and proper and just genuinely nice, and played through all their hits and not so famous songs, and gave a performance to say “yeah, we should have won the mercury prize”. The banter between songs is funnier than you’d expect, but funny in a Stephen Fry-Alan Davies kind of way.

Playing songs with lyrics about punching and screaming at people’s parents makes you stop and question it, maybe even giggle inside at the image of that happening but still it made for a great show. They really do have a collection of misfit anthems, that appeal not only to those indie Rock ‘n’ Rollers but also those country bumpkins with a cup of tea and crumpet.